I recently found my old high school scrapbook (NOT my lame calendar–to be clear), and it had a question that asked, “Where will you live in 20 years?” I wrote “Dallas, Texas!” and my husband first interviewed in Dallas when we moved from Boston, but I thought that it was sweet that my heart has always belonged in Texas.

I’m SO glad we ended up in Houston, because I LOVE IT. I really find it super-duper annoying when people (especially the ones who live here) complain about it. What’s not to love??

The weather,

Yes, I do love the weather. Don’t even try and tell me that it is as hot as hell here, because there is no heat that is as bad as having to dig your car out of ice and snow.

THAT is hell.

the people, the food, the culture, the HEBs, the sports, all the parks. Seriously, David Bacle, get on board. Not to worry, people, he doesn’t read this.

Anyway, when one of my very favorite families called for their annual pics, we came up with the idea to shoot in our favorite town: HOUSTON! They typically spend their year traveling the world, and they ended up spending their summer traveling around Texas, so we thought Houston would be a perfect spot for pics this year.I usually don’t prefer to shoot in full sun, but I thought it would be nice to change it up. We’ve often done lovely sunset/”golden hour” pics together, so I thought that super bright sun would match the fun colors of the artwork. So when you decide to go for a midday shoot, you’re going to have to get creative when you need some portrait-style/closeups. You’ll want to find what we call “open shade,” so you don’t have the harsh, contrasted shadows on your lovely clients’ faces. If there are “blown out” (super bright white) spots in the background, your brain will be okay with it as long as the faces look good. However, when the landscape is part of the shot, go for the full sun! It will look great.I had the littlest here pose for me in true full sun, because I like the background colors, but it’s also a good way to get away with changing it up from the usual look-and-smile pose. I like to use sunglasses or hats or good ol’ make-a-silly-face-for-me pose. The shadows on his face end up adding some interest, instead of being distracting. If he had a normal smile looking at the camera, the shadows would seem too harsh.

Thanks for a fun shoot in Houston, family. It was great fun, as usual!

xoxo, Andrea

Call me for your own H-town shoot, full sun or not. 508.768.5808 or andrea.bacle@gmail.com